BIBLE IN STATE SCHOOLS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 67, 27 March 1913, Page 8

BIBLE IN STATE SCHOOLS.

(To the Editor “Stratford Post.”)

Sir, —I see that in your issue of the 23th inst., Bishop Cleary writes in reply to my letter answering him on the subject of proselytism, but in so doing ho tends to obscure my main uoiut. 1 wished to emphasise the fact that the conditions under which Bible instruction is at present given in State schools in New Zealand leave much to be desired from a teaching standpoint,, and are incidentally ideal for proselytism. The Bible in-Schools League offers a more satisfactory alternative, and I welcome the League’s suggestions as the best that have been put forward up to tho present, but if Bishop Cleary can offer us anything which we may deem to be bettor, J shall be only too glad to give him my support. At present he offers us nothing, yet time is going on and it is becoming daily more apparent that the children of New Zealand need sound religious instruction. If the State is not going to provide for it, it seems to me that the only thing to be done is for the religious bodies to establish schools of their own, and give such instruction in them. This would involve members of such bodies in the twofold obligation of supporting their own schools as well as those of the State. We know that in many cases, the Roman Catholic Church is doing this, and 1 should bo glad to know whether Bishop Cleary, as the result of his own experience, find s this method a satisfactory solution of the difficulty, and whether lie thinks that in the event of denominational schools being more widely established those ■supporting such schools would be justified in looking for assistance—-the form of grants from tho State —in view of the fact that they are paying rates for education in State schools where their children do not attend? 1 am, etc., WILFRID A. BUTLER, M.A. Hon Chaplain to the Bishop of Auckland, and Vicar of Stratford. 27th March, 1913.